20/10/2016

The EMOP or European Month of Photography did start this October. The chance to catch several exhibitions all over Berlin. I only have seen three of them so far but there were each pretty interesting.

Going to BrazilBeing relatively free in my schedule I could join a guided tour of the exhibition called The professor's Journeys - Six Expeditions Through Brazil In The 1930s with the curator. We were only four people, I was the youngest one, the pictures were in black and white and despite the photographer not being a professional the images were very clean and well composed.Going back in timeScanning the EMOP website it was difficult to keep in mind something as there are so many installations. But here and there images were catching my eyes, in particularly one from the Landesarchiv in Berlin and their exhibition Architecture on Glass - Photographs by Otto Hagemann.
I decided to join the vernissage of this exhibition and to reach the place it felt like going to on an expedition. The Landesarchive are far far far away after the Tegel airport. I was basically cycling into the darkness for 12km. I arrived about 30min after the opening, just the time to listen to the last min of the opening speech. Opening speech declaimed in a lovely German administrative tone. It's not that it was in German, but you felt right away that you were not in a art gallery but in an official building, at the archive. Once again I was the youngest, the open bar was open and the pictures really interesting. I skip the photo-geek part, it was medium format images printed on glass plates and more important the images were beautiful. Architecture photography have this formal aspect that highlights the beauty in building as only good architecture photographers can do. Sometimes they succeed to go away from their purely archive duty thanks as well to the exhibition curator.After the In the OffEach serious festival should have an Off program as well. So on my way back to civilization I stopped at the Wilmer Brauerei to attend another vernissage the same evening, this time the Monat Der Fotographie Off. Different location, typical Berlin style, semi abandoned industrial building with images every where or different sizes and formats. Different population as well. I keep in my minds the images of the desert in New Mexico and those specifically from the Very Large Array radio telescope in the middle of nowhere, probably because I have been there a few years ago and it still feels like images from another planet.Less than a week left and a lof of photo exhibitions to catch!

16/10/2016

The location
Second marathon, in Amsterdam after Vilnius last year with many spotters for the TCS Amsterdam marathon 2016. I also met a spotter this year who was part of the team in Lithuania, we call him Martin because his name is Martin. Sadly he could not join me this time - which is also not a bad thing as he is much faster than me - but he could host me. I had the best pasta ever the night before so I can't complain :-)

The days before
I arrived in town Friday evening and the race was scheduled for Sunday morning. The perfect time for me to have a last drink two days before the run. I did plan to stay sober the week before, but I completely failed on that. This week before was a pretty cool one where I spend all my evenings almost going out and meeting with my friends which simply help you to feel good.

Saturday I did the way home to the run start and picked up my registration stuffs. People from everywhere, taking pictures, still smiling, a good atmosphere. After that I went on a small walk but not tool long.

The day of the run
Awake at 6:30am about three hours before the race. Just the time to have a big breakfast and to digest. About 45min before the official departure I'm in the stadium from where we start and will come back later. People are slowly warming up, the challenge is to stay warm without using too much energy and for that matter all plastic bags are transformed into poncho for runner. 9:29am we are all packed, the plastic bags and other capes are flying around and we start! I running with the group 3h00/4h00 this time.

The first 33km
They are fine actually, I'm in my pace, feeling good and should be under the 4hours. The weather is good, the energetic gel taken every 10km have some effect. The race is pretty compact even so there is some space when we pass the sign 25km and the first exhausted people are appearing. Passing the 33km I had have a small blister under my right foot and need to slow down, even walk a few meters...

Needless to say that until 41km it was a bit difficult, but then seing the sign "last 500," I gather my last source of energy and run over at least 100 people which is always a great pleasure for a final time of 4h1min30sec. A lot of people on the side encouraging us, sometimes you could hear your name - it's written on your bib - which gives you a mini kick or energy to keep going, pretty cool! Also funny to look at your tracking device after the race, the path you follow is sometimes below the see level.Going home
Like last year the 12h to 24 hours following the event are a bit painful, you live in slow motion but you are happy. There is a great feeling in you body after all, to have accomplished something, I felt good for days :-) and I want to run another one!

09/10/2016

Yesterday evening I went shortly to the vernissage of the TAC2016, it took place at the neurotitan galerie, a pretty cool place. And this Sunday I went back to take part into a workshop about tape art. What is it you may ask? It's the art of producing arty stuffs with tapes of various colours and shapes.

My first Tape Art Convention came right at the good time. I always like to play with stickers and coloured tape, but I never spend half a day on a piece of work trying to do something. Last time it was just to put some marks on the floor to guide visitors. This time I used more color. Needless to say it was pretty fun.

Workshop
The workshop was conducted by the artist Jay Walker who is also exhibiting his work at the TAC2016, if you have seen the giant heart and skull then you know. It started by a good discussion about his work and was followed by almost 5 hours of works for 5 of us.

My first attempt was - not surprisingly - a big failure as I don't master the technic at all, and by choosing an image - which I thought was simple to reproduce - was way too complicated and a bit frustrating... So I did follow the advices from the instructors: take something a bit easier that you like and try to work on it. I choose the album cover of the
Beastie BoysHot Sauce Committee Part Two. Then it became more fun and absorbing. Once I finished this warm up I turn the board we had each participant to work on a bigger scale surface with a white background.

What can I say? It was pretty interesting, good music in the background, I always like to play with lines and geometry so I was served, I wonder how I can create more curved shapes now, but for sure I will continue to explore this thing.

It's about three weeks that my exhibition Little Planets 2 is over.Right about the time I needed to learn scribus and to create my first catalogue - and not to mentiokn the help of a few friends to be sure that I wasn't written with too many mistake and that visually it was ok-ish.About 3 hours now that catalogue is visible on issuu.